The Internet-of-Things (IoT) has grown substantially. Internet Protocol Version 6 (IPv6) has addresses of many orders-of-magnitude larger than IPv4 (4 billion addresses). Application Specific Integrated Circuits (ASICs) become components on a circuit card (circuit board), which are components in a subassembly or electronic box (physical enclosure). As IPv6 was deployed smaller and more capable components became feasible and were available for electronics' designers; therefore, much smaller devices were able to have IPv6 address assignments, including cell phones, laptop computers, and a wide range of personal and business electronics including fax machines and copiers. ASIC technology turned almost all electronics into ‘computing systems’, as ‘computer-on-a-chip’ devices were readily produced by ASIC manufacturers. Conceptually each unique ASIC could be addressable. Connecting all these IPv6 nodes is a challenge for the radio-frequency (RF) and wired networks. Standards are the process control mechanisms used in products' connections, mostly Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE) ‘802’ standards.
The Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers Standards Association (IEEE-SA) develops standards for global market inter-operability for a broad range of industries, such as power and energy, biomedical and health care, information technology and robotics, telecommunications and home automation, transportation, nanotechnology, and many others. For this patent the most influential is the ‘802’ series. One of the more recent standards is 802.15.6 ((Wireless Body Area Network (BAN))—(e.g. Bluetooth low energy). As the local RF fields near a person becomes integral to the person's behavior, how a person interacts with personal electronics become more and more significant for product interoperability and security. Interferences between signals are a concern for radio-frequency based systems.
Additional non-standard communications technologies are dominated by visible and near-visible photonic (aka ‘light’) components, subassemblies, and systems. ASICs have their photonic counterpart, the Application Specific Photonic Integrated Circuit (ASPIC). IEEE ‘802’ wireless and wired networks have their photonic counterparts: on-board optical port, inter-board fiber optic ribbon cables, retro-reflection for short range, point-to-point telescopic nodes for medium-range distances, and fiber optic cables for very long range. Recently, room lighting has moved from incandescent lighting to Light Emitting Diodes (LED), resulting in the potential for LEDs being used as a modulated photonic source for short range due to the fast switching times of LEDs. LED based photonic communications is also known as ‘Light Fidelity (LiFI)’.
As the IoT has grown so have the wired and wireless networks to interconnect the IoT. Spectrum usage drove the mandatory conversion of analog television to digital television in the United States of America. Digital systems are more aggressively seeking to be computational devices, at all levels of human interaction. Computational capacity of the world grows every year, and seems to have almost no limit as to what can be built using computer functions, such as central processing units (CPUs), memory, interface portals, etc. An increase in computational capacity means higher performance to solve problems, but unfortunately there is also potentially an increased risk of detrimental incursions such as hacking.
The ease of adopting ‘802’ arts and standards enabled modern electronics. Eventually the very easy interfaces became significant vulnerabilities as value was assigned to misuse of the ‘802’ interfaces. These misuses were for financial gain, simple mischief, and everything in between. The logic of ‘securing’ the vulnerabilities generated an entire industry in itself: Cyber-Security. However, the vulnerabilities have become permanent fixtures in the Internet-of-Things, no real fix has been established for nefarious cyber-related activities. Three downfalls of the radio-frequency architectures are: (1) the range the signals can travel, (2) omni-directional nature, and (3) penetration through solid objects. When the radio-frequency based architecture was selected these attributes were advantages to be exploited. Radio frequency (RF) is only one means for eavesdropping, cables can be tapped or just monitored for Electro-magnetic emissions.
Attempts have been made to reduce the hacking of RF emitting devices, including credit card sleeves, which degrade the signal emission by RF-blocker jackets. Passports currently have embedded chips which still emit RF signals even when the passport is closed. When the passport is closed there is a decrease in the RF signal emission; however, the information on the passport can still be hacked, penetrated, or compromised. The closed passport is a low-cost mitigation method, but it is only a “stop-gap” method, the information the passport is still vulnerable to interrogation.
Dongles, fob-like devices which provide randomly generated access ‘keys’ for access into computer systems, have been advertised as ‘secure’ secondary quasi-identification systems, but the dongles have been successfully attacked by ‘sophisticated’ hackers and are not actually ‘secure’.
Air-Gap mechanical separations, where the system is not physically connected to the outside, are employed by some systems as a physical security technique, but there is no protection provided for ‘insider threats’ (removal of data from the server by ‘administrators’, similar to what Edward Snowden did). Air Gap solutions still must address the radio frequency attributes.
Many software-driven hacking events are occurring and being recorded every day. These hacks reside on some hardware component, such as in internal memory or in an ASIC, etc. Current conventional detection practice or logic is to ‘read’ the input of a download of an external device or the internet/intranet and than perform searches for known signatures of a hack. This process is flawed since only the known hacking attempts are detected and are then blocked for access into the system. New types of hacking are continuously occurring, including ‘viruses’, and new detection methods for these new hacks then have to be developed. This is a ‘serial’ cycle of new hacks and then the reaction of new detection methods.
The current hack detection methods are not very effective or successful in detecting all hacking events. One reason is the signature of the hack needs to be ‘detectable’ and ‘readable’ for the current method of detection. Hacks are not always immediately ‘detectable’ since they could be ‘dormant’ inside the system. Hacks are not always ‘readable’ since they could be ‘disguised’ or could be a ‘fragment’. Also, malicious code could still be resident after a system is ‘purged’. Hackers can falsify a system's internal data wherein the hack signature may not be accurate, the detection is deemed unreliable, and the success for detection of the hacks is greatly reduced.
Hacks may or may not reside inside a specific system. The current practice of interoperability and interconnection of systems means a hack could be resident in one system and then migrate into or within other systems. The potential location(s) of the hack increases with the number of interconnected systems and the percentage for a successful detection of the hack decreases.
Optical links can be made point-to-point (telescopic in nature with small beam divergence angles) or with deliberate optical beam spread the larger angle of field-of-view be defined. Retro-reflectors have been fabricated with nearly hemispherical field-of-view. Classic telescopes are made with small beam divergence to concentrate the light, thus a few micro-radian beam divergence allows a telescope to transmit most of its light power over hundreds of meters to many tens of kilometers with minor losses (10 micro-radian telescope over a 30 kilometer distance results in a spot size of 30 centimeters—one foot). Complex optical transfer functions are involved in generating a bit error rate (BER) but in general the desire is to keep a BER below 1 bit in every one-million. Detector noise and other performance considerations are also important. In retro-reflection one of the most dominant factors is the switching rate for the modulation, nominally device size dependent. Beam divergence is not a significant factor in retro-reflection as the range is small, and by definition the retro-reflection return signal is to the source of the photons.
Photonic intra-chip and inter-chip data transports, micrometer to centimeters, could address radio frequency and electronic self-interference and noise. A chip-to-chip communication design for ASPICs is detailed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,598,452 (Goossen, December 1997). In January 2013 an optical waveguide design was patented (U.S. Pat. No. 8,363,9870 by Saeed Bagheri (assigned to International Business Machines Corp). Later in May 2014 (U.S. Pat. No. 8,724,9340) the same inventor (Saeed Bagheri) and assignee extended their work.
Other patents for photonic integrated circuitry include U.S. Pat. No. 7,052,111 (June 2006) which addresses boosting output signals. Spillane and Beausoleil (U.S. Pat. No. 7,570,849 in August 2009) defined layering techniques for electro-optical sub-layers in a multi-layered integrated circuit. Roel Baets et al (U.S. Pat. No. 8,620,120 in December 2013) describe other methods to use photons in conjunction with electrons in integrated circuitry.
Lovejoy et al (U.S. Pat. No. 5,684,308 in November 1997) patented a photo-receiver formed monolithically on an InP semiconductor.
Farnsworth and Wood assigned their U.S. Pat. No. 6,463,377 to Micron Technology Inc of Boise, Id. The basic idea is an internal optical fiber network between circuit cards. This technology has some relevance to fiber optic designs at many levels of integration.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,046,869 (May 2006) addresses serial-to-parallel and parallel-to-serial optical circuitry.
Multi-layered optical interconnections are described in U.S. Pat. No. 7,446,334 by Mears et al.
Light guides (waveguides) are described in U.S. Pat. No. 7,994,467 (Fushman et al in August 2011).
Optical fiber ribbon cable technology is explained in U.S. Pat. No. 8,036,500 (McColloch).
Glass fabrication specification is defined in two patents by lead inventor Wolff, in U.S. Pat. No. 8,168,553 (May 2012) and U.S. Pat. No. 8,404,606 (March 2013).
Different technologies are required to extend the range of transmission to tens of meters or even hundreds of meters. LEDs and various optical designs are patented for these longer ranges. Band gap systems across the visible and near visible spectrum have also been patented. Various optical elements have also been placed in the overall pathway to either increase or decrease the beam acceptance angle. Multiple (segmented) strategies are defined for the various designs.
One of the more common optical techniques is retro-reflection. In one search of the USPTO database, looking only at claims, a total of 35 patents were found to have both ‘modulate’ and ‘retro-reflector’ somewhere in their claims. Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) prior works are known to the authors of this patent application.
U.S. Pat. No. 8,379,286 (Klotzkin at al) in February 2013 is one of multiple NRL patents using ‘multiple quantum well’ technology. Various optical designs were employed in these patents, including ‘Cat's Eye’ optics. This Cat's Eye approach dramatically improves the utility of retro-reflection by removing a critical disadvantage of Free Space Optical Interconnects (FSOI), pointing knowledge of the respective active transmitter and the receiver (in a retro-reflection the ‘receiver is actually a passive retro-reflective ‘transmitter’).
U.S. Pat. No. 8,602,568 (Larsen et al) in December 2013 addresses various techniques for modulation in response to a stimulus.
U.S. Pat. No. 8,228,582 (July 2012) describes retro-reflection using Micro-ElectroMechanical Machines (MEMS), this involves a novel moving parts strategy.
Most of these 35 patents, using the terms ‘modulate’ and ‘retroreflector’ in their claims, are not relevant to this application. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 7,623,253 (Freese et al) in November 2009, is a spectral scanner to be used as a laboratory tool.
The terms ‘computer’ and retroreflector in another USPTO database search of claims resulted in seven (7) found patents. None of these patents appear to be relevant.
Using the terms ‘retro’ and ‘communications’ in a USPTO database search resulted in twenty-nine (29) patents having both terms in their claims. Most of these patents are not relevant (such as U.S. Pat. No. 5,749,253).
In U.S. Pat. No. 5,121,242 (1992, now expired) Kennedy defined an optical switch coupled to a corner cube reflector. His optical switch enabled the incoming photons flux to be modulated before it exited the pathway of the corner cube reflector. This is an example of a passive retro-reflector wherein the beam returns with data content impressed upon it.
In part the logic of the ‘242’ patent was to “provide an optical transceiver that does not require sophisticated tracking or pointing apparatus”. Other features are low power, compact, lightweight, and portable.
A door locking device is reported in U.S. Pat. No. 5,749,263 (not relevant).
U.S. Pat. No. 7,317,876 by Elliott, describes a scheduling system for retro-reflectors. This patent includes a probe device that acts to interrogate individual retro-reflector devices.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,940,446 (May 2011) is an etalon wherein the modulation is defined by the motion of a voltage driven spring system connected to the reflective surfaces (micro-mirrors in some examples).
U.S. Pat. No. 6,045,230 (Dreyer at al) in April 2000 is a classic example of several of the above-mentioned topics. They describe multiple wavelengths, different fluxes, and the utility for safety of people and automobiles.
U.S. Pat. No. 8,961,955 (March 2015) describes RFID safety in the workplace.
U.S. Pat. No. 9,410,420 (August 2016) patented by Ross et al is a classic technology insertion for oil drilling rigs. In this case the movement to wireless communications is a retrofit, thus satisfying the query in the search engine. This patent is not relevant.
The terms ‘cyber’ and ‘accelerometer’ in another USPTO database search (anywhere in the patent language) resulted in two hundred twenty-two (222) patents satisfying the search inquiry. Only one patent U.S. Pat. No. 9,396,437 (Ponomarev et al) had both terms in its claims. U.S. Pat. No. 9,396,437 is for a toy. ‘437’ has no security consideration, it also makes no effort to address any advances from use of optical capabilities. ‘437’ is not relevant to this application.
Additional searches using the key words have been unable to locate a specific patent of any relevance. The six (6) patents found using ‘retro’ and ‘accelerometer’ in the claims are all unrelated and are not relevant. These six patents are (1) U.S. Pat. No. 9,377,301; (2) U.S. Pat. No. 9,367,951; (3) U.S. Pat. No. 7,965,147 (4) U.S. Pat. No. 7,538,688; (5) U.S. Pat. No. 7,295,112; (6) U.S. Pat. No. 5,400,143.
U.S. Pat. No. 9,526,006 (Turgeman) defines an acceleration data to be a second source of identification validation. These are typical techniques and the data are NOT reliable since a hacker can alter the internal contents.
Other background materials of potential interest are patents related to RFID protection. U.S. Pat. No. 8,237,549 (August 2012) describes mechanical blocking of the RF signals.
Supercomputing Patents U.S. Pat. No. 9,081,501 (July, 2015) and U.S. Pat. No. 8,954,712 (fill in date) were assigned to International Business Machines (IBM). These patents teach ganging of ASICs and interconnections using electrical and optical channels.
Application for Patent 2015/0195297 A1 defines a system for protecting automobiles from hacking, using an external monitoring tool operating on data from the individual automobile and a collection of automobiles. Reliance on the vehicle's data is not acceptable if the hacker corrupts the data from inside the automobile.
U.S. Pat. No. 9,749,342B1 dated 29 Aug. 2017, with one inventor being an inventor on this application, wherein the detection of a potential hack can be accomplished using multiple highly correlated data sent to an isolated analysis engine via independent and isolated pathways. U.S. Pat. No. 9,749,342B1 claims are specific to 3 or more independent pathways, with one of the pathways being the computing system, such that a decision can be made as to whether or not a hack has occurred. Hacking detection, the ultimate goal of U.S. Pat. No. 9,749,342B1 allows for undefined actions once detection is complete. However, the base architecture under which the detection is defined assumed the hackers nave ad active controls over the computing system even from remote locations.